


I love dispite your sins

by Anonymous



Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Attempt at Humor, Can be read as a stand alone, Character Study, Dante (Devil May Cry) is a Sweetheart, Dante Needs a Hug, Dante is absolutely three racoons in a leather coat, Dark Humor, Depression, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Implied/Referenced Incest, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Internal Monologue, Introspection, M/M, One-Sided Attraction, Post-DMC5, References to Depression, References to Drugs, Some greek and norse myth thrown in for good measure, Substance Abuse, Suicidal Ideation, Suicidal Thoughts, but it actually isn't, incestual thoughts, the return of racoon dante
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-11
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-16 05:13:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28701243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: He adored his twin, he would have happily given over the keys to the goddamned universe now, if Vergil had only asked him. He wanted to be with his twin, in all senses of the word. He wanted to feel his twin inside him, under him, writing his claim into Dante’s own body with sweat and semen. Perhaps he could have felt whole.Takes place somewhere between Vergil leaving and Dante having a meltdown in the fic Buried Beneath the Ashes of Old Dreams by Lovely_Silhouette.
Relationships: Dante/Vergil (Devil May Cry)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 27
Collections: Anonymous, Spardacest Server Fics and Art





	I love dispite your sins

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lovely_Silhouette](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lovely_Silhouette/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Buried Beneath the Ashes of Old Dreams](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18965194) by [Lovely_Silhouette](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lovely_Silhouette/pseuds/Lovely_Silhouette). 



> This fic is for you, Lovely_Silhouette, as a thank you for inspiring me to actually try and write angst of these two idiots, and as a thank you for the meal that Buried Beneath the Ashes of Old Dreams provided for me and my family. This might not be the 6k fic I was aiming for, but I didn't want to filler it too much.  
> This is also for all you DanVer shippers out there.  
> Special thanks to the people who's server I practically invaded last night to write this. You guys know who you are.  
> Please take heed of the tags. Dante is very much suicidal in this, and the content may have triggering effects on people.

He was already long since drowned by this point.

Well, perhaps drowning was the wrong word. He hadn't started to swim in the first place, the lifebuoy had never been cast out to him, and what little shelter he had owned had, inevitably, long since washed away in the currents and whirlpools sucking him, no, dragging him down into the depths with them.

It was for the best, he had told himself repeatedly, for days now, or perhaps it had been years, the line of time was too blurred for him to look upon and he, living life from bottle to another cheap bottle had become lost in its ocean once more. Reality had so typically delivered yet another blow to him. After all that they had been through, one stumble and their fate had been sealed. Vergil ran, on Dante’s own words no less, but telling himself that didn’t reduce the pain he could feel. Perhaps Vergil had never cared for him, merely using him as a way to gain more power, and like a complete and utter love-struck abomination, he had fallen hook, line and sinker.

He stared at the shattered remains of his broken heart, beating from somewhere amongst the wreckage of cracked glass and dilapidated wood, trying and failing to drown out the sound linking him to his twin with more cheap booze, questionable substances and even cheaper morals. But there was never enough, not for his constitution.

If he had been human, he would probably have already died from liver failure or alcohol poisoning, his body festering in its shell long before it was found, but as it was, his demon, the wretched thing kept him alive, against his will, repeatedly healing over the liver scarring and damage, keeping his tormented existence teetering on the brink, without actually killing him, sweet torture to remind him of his own sins.

Even the alcohol was starting to be acclimated to, his body absorbing the toxins and growing from them, strengthening his resistance to the poisons in the bloodstream, his blood had to be at least half alcohol by now, right? He had begun practically sweating the liquid out of himself at this point, And still, his demon wouldn't let him die with dignity, and his gun was out of bullets. The wall behind him splattered with blood and goodness knows what else.

He just wanted to sleep, damn it, slipping into oblivion’s sweet, elusive embrace and be done with all this malarkey. But of course, his body just wouldn't do what his brain wanted, the inept thing it was. His stomach had stopped allowing food to sit in it, bringing anything that dared to linger down in it for more than an hour, and he didn't care. He was just so damn tired.

He held back another lung shaking sob, stuffing his fist tighter into his teeth, sounds escaping him that he didn't want to admit felt more like a whimper than a cry. The half-smashed bottle in his other hand fell to the floor with a shatter and even that didn't move him from his torpor. There had to be another way to end it, surely? If he couldn't have Vergil with him, then he wouldn't be here at all.

His eyes felt like sandpaper, his tears all spent. And somewhere amongst the ruins of his shop were the microscopic shards of happiness that had been there, making the darkness all the harder to bear. If only he hadn't fucked up-if only he had brought flowers-if only he had done any number of infinite things to change this situation.

Had he said something wrong? Had he laughed at a comment from his other half too hard? He didn't know, and not knowing was eating him alive. He did know, but he didn’t want to-. What if he had taken Vergil's hand and kissed it, instead of pushing him away in his fear? Would his brother still be beside him? What if he had-

His teeth clenched down on his fist together, tooth scraping against bone. His blood, his twin's blood flowing into his mouth, and his tongue prodded at the wound, a flare of heat pooling at the taste, his demon rearing its vile little head, tricked into thinking his perfect opposite was close, only to scream in unholy magma at the lack of Vergil.

God, he must have truly been fucked.

And of course, like old wooden horses, his memories heaved themselves through his mind, as if he couldn't get enough guilt already. Had it all started back then? Was he really so blind...?

Goodbye, youthful shivers he was clinging to, the majestic halo that encircled his treasured memories, the dazzling twilight of a youth he could have had, and the future he had dreamed he could have had with Vergil by his side. 

For the first time in a long time, his eyes felt open, pried wide by necessity and the harsh, cold slap of reality, and, quite frankly, it fucking sucked. The world had gone grey and had lost its natural splendour and beauty it had had while Vergil had been there. See, Vergil? He could do big words too, arsehole.

Another shudder warred its way across his body. Gods, he was such a fucking coward. His demon was a bitch. He couldn't even die correctly when he wanted to. Fuck. He should have fucking stopped while he was ahead, kept it all nice and soft, bundled in a fake bow of smiles and slight glances at his perfect other. God fucking damn it.

Vergil had been his very own, personal Sun, his guiding star, and like Icarus before him, he had flown too close to the light for far too long, his wax wings melted, and his eyes now blinded. Was this perhaps wrathful vengeance of a divine God? He deserved this, surely. It must have been his fault. Did he not love Vergil enough? Had he been blinded to his heart's gentle breezes and soft flattering?

And now his heart was in ribbons, he was crumbling, sitting shoulderless and stroked on a filthy seat, tired and weary, and feeling the sickness bone deep inside himself. He just wanted to sleep. He had been so fucking tired since Vergil had left. So tired. Of it all. And he couldn't even get out of it, and not for want of trying. Maybe if he could find Rebellion again, maybe if-

He wished he could just fucking stop. The mournful sand had long since stopped falling from his hourglass eyes, his spirit was in fucking ruins, crumbling in the ransacking of Carthage. And somewhere in there, in amongst all the rubble and glass, was the leftover of the man that Vergil had so vehemently shattered with glowing wonder.

Quite frankly, he felt like shit, and probably smelt like it too. He'd spent his whole life building a perfect storm around him, always looking for possible ways to avoid his pale and confusing reflection, and so when he had gained it again, perhaps it was only natural that he pushed his perfect other away. With jokes as well as tender hurts, with words spoken with razor blades as well as love disguised as fear.

Maybe Lady and Trish were right. Maybe it was time to move on from his own arsehole, his own wombmate and find another. Maybe he should close the shop for a while, call Nero over, get him to shoo-

No. He couldn't put that on the kid, not after everything he had gone through. Heavens knows the boy has gone through enough. Fuck. He was pathetic. Why did he have to fuck up something that had been so perfect? Why was it always him? Why was he the universe's trash heap? He snarled, a warbling mess of noise, against the bones of his fingers. 

For fucks sake.

Had he committed such an egregious act against the gods in a previous life that Hades had cursed him to forever be the clean-up boy and never the manager? His free hand hanging beside him twitched, eager to sink his claws into something and rip it to shreds. Feast on the carcass, and die in the wilds, like good prey, forever waiting for a predator that would never come to him again.

Above him, the filament flickered, clamouring to the last threads of life, defiant even to the end. Gods damn it. Even his shop couldn't have the decency to collapse in on him when he wanted it to.

Resurrecting his head from its grave on his chest, he scanned the room with confused eyes, blinded by the flickering briefly, the light pressing even more into him his deepening sorrows.

Beneath the structures of pizza boxes, last week's takeouts, bowels scraped clean of tangy E numbers and bottles of high proof cheap booze, he spied the couch, standing against the gunk like a sinner, begging for forgiveness at the altar, warped and damaged, but still seeking redemption, and for the briefest of eternities, he felt a splattering of hope in his chest, before it was rudely drowned out by the soul-numbing grey sheet surrounding him.

His mind felt heavy, and a migraine was starting to reduce more syrupy pain for him to focus on, rather than his hand or heart, and for a brief moment, he thought he would be okay. Focus on one pain, not the other. _You don’t need him. He doesn't want you anymore. He never did want you. You always thought with your dick first, you goddamned freak._

It was into that gnawing darkness growing deep inside of him that he threw himself willingly, even if his demon seemed adamant at pulling him back from that same precipice. He just wanted to sleep, forget it all happened. It would all be okay if he could just sleep. It would turn out to be a bad dream, he would wake up, Vergil would still be there, and his heart would burst with the happiness that only his soulmate could provide and they would make love on the ruins of the dreams he would tell Vergil about.

Vergil would scoff and remind him that he wasn't going anywhere, that he was his, that he lov-

No. That was too far, even for him. Vergil wasn't coming back. He'd made that much clear. The door still bears its scars from their fight. He had fucked up, and no amount of grovelling would solve it. He would continue to pray to the liquid gods in the bottles, allowing each sip to baptise him in the grace of his own newly chosen God. Where once he had played offerings to Vergil, he now sort the guidance from the rim of a glass.

It always came back to the alcohol, because of course, it did. It was a vicious cycle, and one he would harken to.

His lungs burned by the lack of Vergil in them, his heart pumping 90% proof through his veins, as though it was actual blood, his liver, wilted and shrivelled, but somehow still clinging to life by the unholy power of his demon, screaming at him to find their soulmate and prove he was worthy of them.

Honestly, the bottle was easier to listen to. It was almost second nature now. Sober up for a few minutes, long enough to know he didn't want to be, finish the bottle in his hand, throw it away and find yet another amongst the wreckage of love and seeping red liquid around him. Try to pretend he couldn't still taste Vergil on the air, under his skin, on his tongue. At least the bottle didn’t bitch back at him for not listening or doing what it demanded.

It had almost been easier when he knew he'd killed him. This time, the pain was constant and new, forged in love and blood, only for the stitching of the old wounds to be torn away, the pain seeping like puss. Damn it. If only he had done something. 

His brother deserved more at life than just him, his brother deserved to dine with the kings of eld, upon the feasts of gods, and taste the finest things, not be caged like some goddamned bird in gilded bars, his very own Persephone, shackled to the whims of a wistful god. As fucking if. It would never come to him that easy, not without a fight first, and he knew it.

He really was damned from the start. And like a mouse on an endless wheel, like clockwork, he would be called in again to fox whatever mess his brother would cause, only this time, maybe the humans could deal with it themselves. He couldn't bare facing his other half so soon. The pain was still fresh and raw, the alcohol not high enough proof to keep it at bay. Another sip and another loss of lucidity for him, one more rung on the devil's board. He'd never get to see their mother again, he'd made peace with it long ago.

Peace? Yeah, right. He'd fought claw and talon to escape his own head and then realised that when he couldn't, he'd turned to the drink. 

Once a demon, always a demon. A halo can never reform in the broken horns of a demon… He didn’t have the heart to face their mother, even if he knew he would be granted access to the paradise waiting for the souls of humanity.

What did it matter, when he had been sitting here drinking for days? He felt fine, he was happy, right? His brother had shown his true colours once again, and Dante should have been proud, right? And proud that Vergil had been moving on with his life, not stuck 20 years in the past like him. It was always Vergil who got the nicest of things, even after he tore half the world to get it, it would still be handed over to him with a smile and a silver platter. His arsehole brother would probably thank them and then gut them, no purely matter of principle. Jesus fucking Christ, would it kill him to let Dante catch a piece of that pie for a change? Of course not. He'd be forced by whatever divinity hated him that day to go in, sweep up the debris and return home, like some goddamned interstellar cleaning crew. Maybe he needed to invest in a maid outfit too, to really seal the deal. He’d be forgotten and cursed, just as much as his brother was loved and revered.

Shitting Christ in a handbasket. Maybe this was his torment of Prometheus, for giving the gift of not caring to himself. He would drink away his world until the birds came down with more alcohol for him, and he would continue drinking, drowning his sorrows in brown liquid and fire in his mouth. Each sip a blasphemy against his good god of a brother, Vergil.

He had prayed at the altar of Vergil for too long, begging him to waltz back into his life as though nothing had happened, with not even an apology, and kiss him until he couldn't tell where he began and Vergil ended.

Was he still even Dante at this point, or an amalgamation of them both?

So, here he sat, living by the bottle, dying by the bottle. There was a sense of poetry about it, he supposed. His body would falter as soon as his blasted healing would stop, and then he would be free from the torment. At least that's what he was telling himself, even if he didn't fully believe the words.

Perhaps, in his need for alcohol, he had stumbled into an alternate, parallel universe, one in which Vergil did not need him anymore. 

Yeah sure. Keep telling yourself that.

Even he knew he didn't have that much luck.

For fucks sake. Why was it him again? Why couldn't it have been Nero for a change? Did the gods above really hold that much disdain for him? Clearly, the answer was yes.

The bottle in his hand was nearing empty. 

If only his head was.

Sparda would be so proud of him.

His mother...? Eh. Not so much.

But hey, at least he was still here, right, isn’t that what Vergil had said, while they were both vacationing in hell? At least they were both still here? Even against his most stringent efforts, he was still kicking and screaming, still drowning himself in a storm of alcohol and fire.

Where had he put his lighter..?

Maybe the drugs would help numb him. That's what the songs always said, right? "We'd been dancing with Mr Brownstone..."

Perhaps his demon would find that method of self-mutilation more affable than the copious amounts of fermented liquor.

The lighter would spark, the amount of vapour in the air would cause the spark to leap at him and he could finish what his mother had begun so long ago. Baptized in fire, cremated in fire.

He should have been a lyricist. Making poetry about a death that he couldn't even bring about.

At least it wouldn't have been as painful. It would have been more a "Yes sir, no sir, three bags full, sir." Gig, than whatever crap the trash men of life had birthed him with. 

He was still carrying around the same garbage liner too. See? Poetic. Musical. 

Holy Christ on a cross.

Of course, other options would probably work with a greater or lesser effect. Any number of options and combinations, equations and divisions, but that could take years, if not decades. Maybe he should go out to find a quick fuck too before he left the world so that it could come back to haunt him in 20 years or something. Just to throw the symmetry of it all back into Vergil's face.

See how that would throw the fucker off.

Who was he kidding? He probably couldn't fuck anyone if he wanted to. Vergil had seen to that, by writing himself into the deepest corners of himself and in his most secret of spaces. He had become addicted to his brother, in ways that even the alcohol and suspicious substances couldn't replace. 

Perhaps that's why it was still hurting so much.

He wasn't fooling anyone, including himself. Or excluding. Or any word ending -cluding at all. And he was fine with it. Maybe.

The alcohol in his system was giving him a pleasant buzz, his fingers were numb and the tears from his eyes had left raw scars on his face, but he was fine. Absolutely fine. Right?

Sure, he could fake a smile, make a self-deprecating joke, and play it up for the kids, while feeling the pain in here and knowing it wouldn't go away, but that was normal humanity, right? He'd been living with them so long that maybe he was starting to understand that most men didn't put socks in with the shirts in a spin cycle, but that was fine too. He had smarts elsewhere. 

Most men couldn't handle a sword through the goddamned chest regularly either. But he was still human enough to recognise that he wasn't human, even without his brother's untimely intervention for him.

He. Was. fine. Normal. Content. Two entire halves of a single happy meal, hey come drink this mixed and cocktailed with this chemical for a free toy!

Come eat this obvious poisonous thing to experience true enlightenment!

The blood of Sparda was a fucking nightmare.

And he couldn't bring himself to care much, or perhaps that was just the amount of booze in his fermentation system that dared claim itself to be a digestive tract. It wasn't fooling anyone either, but at least no one seemed to care on that front.

He wasn't fooling anyone either, but hey, at least no one was calling him out on it anymore, after the first mess of a nuclear fallout of his anger.

Trish and Lady had fucked off to parts unknown to distant places more unknown, and that was the way he liked it. He could at least pretend to stew in his own bile for a while.

Or at least until the kid came around to pull him out of it.

Christ. He was a mess. And of course, the kid wouldn’t help matters. He'd tried and Dante had allowed him in the same room as him for at least a few seconds before his likeness to Vergil had caused him to snap again. _Go and die again, Vergil, fuck off and leave me, just like then, go be with your own people for a fucking eternity, see if I care._

The kid had left shortly after too, with some heated words of his own. It seemed that all he could do was push family and friends away from him.

The kid at least probably didn't hate him yet. Kyrie would have probably talked to him and brought his pain down. He wondered idly if Vergil had even thought about him since going to his son’s home.

Vergil had been his Kyrie. And just like with Nero, his own order of the Sword had cursed him out, and he wanted to cling harder, dragging his other back to him, kicking and screaming if need be.

He hadn't washed for about a brief eternity, he hadn't slept since the birth of the universe, or so it seemed, in reality, it was probably nearing a week, or maybe a month. The days were blurring.

And his demon was bitching at him too. _Yeah yeah, I can hear you, I just don't like you._

For fucks sake. _Just leave me the fuck alone, damn you._

His favourite bars had locked him out after the first day. He'd drank them dry and was still demanding more. There was never enough, always too much, but never enough for him.

Vergil had been his everything, and it showed.

His world was falling apart, and he was sitting fiddling for the emperor in the palace while Rome burned around him. But he was clearly fine. He was making it up as he went. He was fine. It was all such a fucking joke.

He couldn't even laugh at his own joke anymore.

His thoughts were becoming coherent again. Fuck. Need more. He brought the bottle to his lips, draining what little life it had left before chucking it at the wall, a dry heaving sob escaping him. Fuck.

_Where the fuck was his drink?_

It had been in his hand and now it wasn't. Just like Vergil.

_Oh hey, you know this vice? Hey yeah, you don't have to any more. Now learn to fucking live with it._

The prick. He just had to get the last laugh in.

The haze of the booze leaving him was filling him and He didn't care too much, or even bring himself to care enough. There was too much, there wasn't enough, there was never enough.

Even his own supply had run out, drank down with a limited supply of painkillers and sleeping tablets, all in the hopes of complications that just wouldn't fucking come.

Maybe Vergil should have stabbed him again. Tore his heart out and left. That's how they communicated, right? That was the language of the Sparda bloodline, right? Words were useless when you didn't really know the language and the others were dancing to a tune you didn't even recognise yet.

Typical. How like his bastard of a brother.

And like some kind of thrice-cursed godsent miracle, Vergil appeared, a shimmering haze of absolution preaching to the converted, staring down at him with all the authority of the cosmos.

Heh. If only. That could have been the perfect end, but no, this was no fairy tale. There would be no prince in shining armour to pry him from his own misery. And even if there had been a fairy, did he really think he would have been given a wish?

Even the devil himself wasn't as naive as he found himself becoming.

And onto that silken strands of misery holding him, he poured himself, saturating it with his own soul. 

Where the fuck was his drinks?

_99 bottle of beer on a wall~_

_And not a fucking drinkable drop in his hand._

Jesus fucking Christ. He was a wreck. Proud of it too. Wait. What was that thought?

Ugh, his brain was water in a sieve and the alcohol was wearing off. He needed more. Always more.

Just as Vergil craved the power of all forms, was drawn to it, moulded by it and loved it until he found other sources much stronger; strength being of course, relative to power; he was forgotten and cast aside in search of a stronger, more elusive power.

How like him. To finally find happiness in his twin, his other perfect being, only to have it dashed away like ships on a broken shore. 

Perhaps it was true. Only a demon could love another demon.

Okay, so maybe that was actually bullshit. Clearly, demons could love more than demons. He and Vergil were literal living, walking proof of that tale, even if it had brought him nothing but hardship. He wouldn't trade it for the entire world.

Okay, so maybe he would have at one point, and maybe would again now, but it was the thought that counted, right? The whole world could have burned and he would have sat aside, happy in the knowledge that his twin was nearby, breathing and loving him, all the while cursing him on the same breath. Maybe it wasn’t love in the conventional sense. He adored his twin, he would have happily given over the keys to the goddamned universe now, if Vergil had only asked him. He wanted to be with his twin, in all senses of the word. He wanted to feel his twin inside him, under him, writing his claim into Dante’s own body with sweat and semen. Perhaps he could have felt whole. He choked back another sob, clenching his blurry eyes to hide from the world.

There was blood on his hands, he could taste it, holes barely closed, still weeping, and in his mouth, coating his tongue. The blood he shared with Vergil. Their twinned lives. 

It still tasted amazing, almost as good as Vergil's own.

Fuck. He missed him

_Quick, reach for another bottle, don't think about much, just down half the damn thing and let the alcohol be a suture to wounds that would probably never close._

The taste burned his tongue and throat, fire in his veins, lava in his lungs. Here he was, falling apart and waxing lyrical on his heartbreak. Christ preaching to the choir much?

He didn't need Vergil, didn't want him. Of course not. It was obvious to him that the only thing he needed was the alcohol and an unlimited bottle. 

Quite an ungainly vice.

Fuck. He could picture and hear Vergil saying it, and fuck if the thought didn’t arouse him some. He shuddered more as he signed another mouthful, rubbing his nose on his rotten gloves, trying to ignore the phantom hands searching and exploring his body. They weren’t Vergil’s hands. _No thanks, I’m not interested in whatever it is you’re selling this time, buddy, but thanks for all the fun, and I’ll see you some time next never? Sounds like a date._

He needed his twin. He craved him, desired him, couldn’t breathe without him, could barely live.

His hand was starting to resemble Vergil, what with the blood and scowl, Maybe if he used Devil Sword Dante to slice a locket of hair off, he could arrange it to sit as Vergil had his. Slip-on an off-white sock and call it a posh wank. Maybe he would have been happier if he had stuck in a solo fling with his hand instead of his twin. 

Jesus, he really missed him.

Oh, who the hell was he trying to kid anyway? How could any of this mess be considered fine, by any stretch of the imagination? He wasn't fine, he felt like shit, he smelt like shit and his heart lay in tatters somewhere in the garbage on the floor, where it belonged, where it had always belonged. The damn thing was too soft and still loved Vergil. 

As did he and his demon.

Maybe there had been a mistake, a misunderstanding. Maybe it wasn't his fault.

_The car broke down, the suit was ripped, the minister was sick, it wasn't his fault. It has to be mine!_

Maybe in another dimension, he could have wondered what he had done wrong.

He had tried to be a constructive member of society, had tried to make a life for himself with no papers and no legal history. He’d became a man, He even owned his own ~~failing~~ business, he paid ~~barely~~ enough taxes. He was existing at least, if not truly living. Sure, he had occasionally had a night out with the ladies, he had fooled around before promising himself to his brother, but he perhaps had never truly lived like he had when Vergil was with him, near him, beside him, over him, in him. His life story wove a eulogy to his twin and he knew every word of it and sung with each breath his torturous lungs took.

He hated it now.

He could feel true hatred, pain and suffering. He understood it now, instead of just the shadow of the feeling he had felt then, that he had mistakenly called hate.

His mind was clear enough now, and he had started to change his mind. He wanted Vergil again, to see him, to know he was okay, to just know that he was safe. He wanted to bare himself to his other and know that he was welcomed and loved back.

The phone was only there.

The distance away from him was an entire ocean of melancholia and depravity. And of course, he would force himself to cross it.

Somehow.

One foot in front of the other, slow and steady as the alcohol was burned out of his system by the flames gnawing at his desires now. The bottles poured around his bare feet, and he treaded on the wreckage of the love he had so sort after. _The desk was right there. The phone is there. Just. Keep. Moving._

Raising here, a hand, a hand meeting cold wood, the intersection of a soul meeting an inanimate object containing the link to his other half, his better half, his perfect-

No. Now is the time for action, not thinking about his next move.

His hand gripped the cool wood of the desk, feeling it under his fingers, and he took a deep breath, steadying himself, reaching for the handle of the phone itself. Doubts ran through his mind as he stared at the dial, fingers trembling a hair’s breadth away from the rotary.

The last of the alcohol in his blood was burned from his system with a righteous flame. He picked up the device and trembling, dialled the number burned into his memory.

"Kyrie, hey, uh…” His voice faltered for a moment, his confidence fading in the face of raw emotion he couldn’t hide from the sweet young lady on the phone. “Can you uh… put Nero on? It's about my brother. I-I need to know that he is...okay." He would wait for another millennium if need be. He just needed to know that his brother was alive and thinking of him. He just needed to know- He just needed to know that Vergil still loved him.

He wasn't crying. Devils don't cry. It was the rain. It always was.


End file.
